Teaching and Learning

Economy Hinders Teacher Contracts And Leadership of Unions

Tight times do not happy teachers make.

Last week, for example, teachers in Broward County, Fla., approved a
new contract by what union leaders characterize as the unusually low
majority of 60 percent.

And of that number, "at least a third of the people ... are pretty
dissatisfied, but they simply recognized that under the present
economic conditions, it was the best contract agreement at this time,"
said John Ristow, a spokesman for the 15,000-member Broward Teachers
Association.

The school board for the 275,000-student district that includes Fort
Lauderdale approved the pact in a closed session Jan. 27 and is set for
a final vote this week.

The contract would give teachers an average 3 percent raise for each
of the three years of the agreement. Actual percentages are set to
range from a third of 1 percent to 15 percent, with more experienced
teachers generally reaping more, according to Mr. Ristow. The first
year's raises would go into effect in the current school year, and the
third year's are tied to state funding.

Teachers also stand to get a $2,000 cash incentive to change to a
less costly health- insurance plan and $1,000 for extra duties.

The contract includes a "career ladder"—which the state says
it will require in every district by next school year—but only
about 300 of Broward's teachers who have earned certification from the
National Board for Professional Teaching Standards are eligible for the
top two rungs, Mr. Ristow said. Some of those teachers would get up to
$20,000 additional a year under the program.

The pact brings to a close negotiations between the National
Education Association affiliate and the district that stretch back to
last summer and have been punctuated by teacher work slowdowns and
protests. The new pay scale runs from $32,700 to $61,411.

Competition in Chicago

Another of this school year's bitter contract fights appears to have
generated more candidates than usual in the race for president of the
Chicago Teachers Union.

Incumbent Deborah Lynch, who in October presented teachers with a
contract that they rejected, faces at least three challengers: Marilyn
Stewart, an elementary special education teacher and a member of the
union caucus that Ms. Lynch's group defeated three years ago; William
Malugen, a high school teacher who has formed the new Frontline Caucus;
and Judy Dever, an elementary teacher and a member of the union
executive board, who is running as an independent. Union members have
until March 26 to file for the post, and at least one other candidate
is expected.

Historians of the 33,000-member American Federation of Teachers
affiliate say it has been 20 years since the president's contest has
drawn more than two candidates. And while Ms. Lynch's camp attributes
the number of hats in the ring to the democratic "openness" that many
acknowledge has been a strength of her tenure, other observers link it
to deep dissatisfaction with the new contract.

The four-year pact, approved by the school board and the union in
November, calls for 4 percent annual raises in addition to "step"
increases for additional years of experience and slightly higher
health-insurance costs. It drew the backing of 55 percent of the
members who voted, averting a strike that union delegates had approved
after teachers rejected the earlier agreement.

Even those who admire Ms. Lynch, a classroom teacher and union
delegate before being elected in 2001, wonder if she was tough enough
at the bargaining table. "Because of a lack of experience, she didn't
come out strong, people felt," said Kristen A. Schroeder, a teacher at
the Annie Keller Regional Gifted Center. "I think it will be a close
race."

Showdown in New York

Meanwhile, the beginning in earnest of contract negotiations between
the New York City teachers' union and the administration of Mayor
Michael R. Bloomberg has become a showdown.

City and district officials have been talking for months about the
burden of teacher-contract rules, sounding a note so insistent that
Randi Weingarten, the president of the 80,000-member United Federation
of Teachers, put forward her own proposal for a "thin" pact governing a
pilot group of schools. In exchange for many fewer protections than in
the current 200-page document, teachers would be given a greater voice
in school decisions, she said last fall.

But the city's labor commissioner, James F. Hanley, arrived at the
bargaining table this month with much more—or, it might be said,
much less— than that. He put forward a minimalist contract that
would end most seniority and tenure rights, as well as hand a wide
array of management decisions to school administrators. And the package
contained no raises. City officials said instead that the streamlined
contract would make for savings that could be used for pay hikes.

The Feb. 6 session lasted less than two hours, and Ms. Weingarten
emerged to lambaste city officials. "This proposal is an insult to
children, parents, and teachers," she said in a statement, adding that
perhaps the radical contract was meant to divert attention from failing
efforts at school improvements. Ms. Weingarten and other officials have
predicted an impasse.

Anticipating that possibility, the AFT local is pushing state
legislation in Albany that would give its members automatic raises if
state officials determined that the administration of Mr. Bloomberg, a
Republican who gained broad powers over the school system in 2002, was
stonewalling negotiations.

Those are some of the recommendations made late last month by a
blue-ribbon panel looking for ways to get and keep highly capable
teachers for the 1.1 million-student New York City system. The Goldman
Sachs Teacher Quality Forum produced the report and was supported by a
grant from the Goldman Sachs Foundation, which has its headquarters in
the city.

In the area of hiring, the committee said that teachers who take a
traditional pathway into the classroom should be given tuition help and
other incentives at the same rate as those pursuing an alternative
route, which is not now the case. It recommended that the district
continue to expand its use of the Web for recruiting teachers and
provide summer internships for new hires to help them make a better
start in the fall.

The group also urged more research to discover relationships between
pathways into teaching, student outcomes, and teacher retention.

The report envisions that new teachers would gather at restaurants
and attend cultural events free or at a discount so they would not be
priced out of the city's myriad attractions. It also recommends paid
leaves for veteran teachers who would under the program work for up to
a year in jobs related to their subjects. A science teacher might work
in a lab, for instance.

Finally, to keep teachers in the city's schools for the long term,
the report calls for smaller classes and schools, more time for
preparation and collaboration with colleagues, and better
principals.

Presidential Choice

Despite how it may look, the White House insists it was only
following the will of Congress when it inserted a line item for the
first time in its proposed fiscal 2005 budget for the American Board
for Certification of Teacher Excellence.

In his budget plan released this month, President Bush suggested $7
million be appropriated to the Washington-based ABCTE, said Michael J.
Petrilli, an associate deputy undersecretary for the U.S. Department of
Education. That money is part of a $35 million, five-year initiative
announced last fall that originally was to have come out of the
department's discretionary fund.

The organization is controversial for trying to replace traditional
teacher training with a test as an alternative means of licensing
teachers.

Congress, however, mentioned the organization by name in its fiscal
2004 spending bill that included the Education Department, setting the
precedent for the White House to do so, Mr. Petrilli said.

At the same time, President Bush, as he has every year since taking
office, has snubbed the National Board for Professional Teaching
Standards. The rigorous certification process for teachers already in
the classroom is recognized by all 50 states. In the past, Congress has
appropriated money for the board, most recently $10 million in fiscal
2004.

The administration has long been a fan of the ABCTE as well as other
alternative routes into the teaching field.

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